The Pagan Left

Tuesday, September 13, 2005

Idus September

Modern Date : September 13th

Idus SeptemberThe Ides of September

This day, is for special religious observance.

The LectisterniumThe Ides of September (The Lectisternium) are sacred to the Capitoline triad - Jupiter, Juno and Minerva, for whom temples were dedicated in 509 BC. A festival of Greek origin, it was first ordered by the sibylline books. From it's beginning, a banquet was regularly offered to Jupiter, Juno and Minerva, at which the Senate officiated, in conjunction with the plebeian games. The images of the three deities were dressed with curls, anointed, and garbed in colors. Jupiter was placed reclining on a cushion with a goddess seated on a chair on each side. Mars and Venus were always placed together.

Juno is the wife of Jupiter and the deified queen of heaven and womankind. She protects the growth and well-being, as well as the fertility, of every woman. Minerva is considered to be the sublime female abstraction of thought or mind. The name Minerva is derived from the word memini (to remember). Her realm is that of wisdom, education, industriousness, commerce, and the various arts that women practice, including sewing arts and music. Minerva is considered to be the Roman equivalent of Athena, but not as a warlike personification.

On this day people thronged to the Temple of Ceres form all over the country where they made vows and offerings. This is one of the days on which the salt cakes, the mola salsa, were used as part of the sacrificial meal. This is the only day of the month in which sacrificing and feasting would occur in public.

The Ludi Romani, the great games in honor of Jupiter (Jove) continued this day and were celebrated through to the 19th.

The emperor Titus died this day in 81 AD in Aquae Cutiliae. He was 41. His last words were the enigmatic "I have made but one mistake." Having reigned most excellently, it was probably the one that killed him -- he apparently died from malaria.

Cicero writes of this day, "Crassus had gone back to Rome on the concluding day of the dramatic festival, feeling deeply stirred by the speech reported to have been delivered at a meeting by Philip, who, it was said, had declared it to be incumbent on him to devise some other plan of action, as it was impossible for him to carry on the government with the present Senate; and on the morning of September 13, at the summons of Drusus he and a crowd of members came to the senate-house, where Drusus, after a long series of complaints against Philip, moved for a vote of the Senate on the definite issue that a consul had in public assembly delivered an extremely violent attack upon their order."

September is the 'magical' seventh month (after March).

Egyptian Festival of LightsThe Egyptian All-Soul's Day occurred on the 27th day of Paopi. This Festival of lighting the fires of Neith honored the goddess Nephthys or Nebthet, protectress of the dead, with fires. Fires were lit before the statues of the dead and the gods. The ceremony was accompanied by a general illumination which lasted all the night.

Nephthys, the mother goddess, is the oldest of the Egyptian Neterw. Neter, plural neterw (pronounced Neteru) is the Egyptian word for "god", understood as an elemental force of Nature in which the One Divinity manifests. This is why the words Neter and Nature are cognate. (Paopi, month of Ptah, day 27).